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Please Teacher Volume 1:

Hot for Teacher

please teacher

Please Teacher (or Onegai Teacher as it is known in Japan) was a popular romance series and one that drew my attention as it was released. The science fiction base (albeit a light one) is used merely as a plot device to set the situation of a romance series. This series does something that most won’t, it delves into the truths of a young romance and does an excellent job of showing the perceptions and drives of the people involved.

Episode 1: Tell Me, Teacher

Before the start of the next term, our male protagonist Kei Kusanagi is watching the lake near his home, when a ethereal beauty appears nearby. Being surprised once she sees him, he runs away and right into the lake. Awakened the next day at school by Koishi (the girl who is in love with Kei) we are introduced to all of Kei’s friends: Matagu (the lovable loser, a boy who wants to be in a relationship but no-one reciprocates his feelings), Ichigo (the quiet girl who is much smaller than everyone else), Hyosuke (the raging loud-mouth, a forward driven happy-go-lucky genius),

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and Kaede (the tall beautiful girl who is in love with Hyosuke). Hyosuke informs the class that the old teacher has retired and the new teacher is a young woman. The new teacher is the woman from last night, and she introduces herself as Mizuho Kazami.

After school, Kei returns home, and is checked out by his uncle Minoru (who is a doctor). Living with his uncle Minoru (the sex craved nut) and aunt Konoha (the reserved

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wife), Kei stays with them because of his medical condition (which he calls “standstill”) which causes him to become unconscious and enter a trance-like state for periods up to a year. While relaxing at home, he sees Mizuho moving in next door and offers to help her with the boxes. While carrying the last box together, they trip and fall into each other’s arms – and Kei enters an inopportune standstill. After awaking, he discovers that he’s been out for a few hours and Mizuho’s been keeping an eye on him the entire time.

After talking for a few moments, she discovers that Kei remembers seeing her from the night before and transports him to her ship where she "reveals" herself and the ship to some hilarity.

Episode 2: I Can’t Get Married Anymore

Starting off at school the next day, the talk amongst the students surround the sighting of the UFO. Kei can’t focus on this though as he continues to think about what happened after Minoru and Konoha discovered them, a sit down talk where they wanted to know what was going on between Kei and Mizuho. After interrogating the duo, they are unable to get the answers that they wanted and decide to talk again tomorrow – but not before Minoru and Konoha discover that Kei and Mizuho are already closely knit.

Knowing that the second meeting is coming up, Mizuho decides that she had best talk to Kei so that they can straighten out their stories for later. Transporting Kei to the utility shed, they begin to talk strategy and eventually deciding that they should claim to be lovers to Kei’s family, which would allow them to cover up the story about Mizuho being an alien. While they are still talking, a gym class was over and some students entered the shed to return equipment and locked the doors behind them. Now trapped, Mizuho calls Marie to have them transported out but Marie is still suffering from Kei’s attack and transports himself there and immediately falls asleep. Now really trapped, Kei and Mizuho spend the time talking about themselves – Kei relates information about his sickness and Mizuho tells Kei that she is on Earth to examine the school systems. After a few hours, Kei and Mizuho are saved with by Minoru with who he thinks is the janitor… but is actually the school superintendent.

With a more intense interrogation going on, the original plan of claiming that they were lovers will get Mizuho fired and Kei expelled. Trying to help, Minoru tells the superintendent that they are already married (which would be possible because Kei is 18 years old) and that Mizuho was assigned the job after they were married.

Episode 3: This Isn’t Right, Teacher

Believing this story, the superintendent lets them go for now – and Minoru rushes to get the paperwork in place. Their new life together comes with a catch, they must not let the general student body know that they are married, especially Kei’s classmates.

Now married, Minoru and Konoha move Kei to Mizuho’s house and they try to maintain a married life as well as their deception. Holding an on the spot wedding for the two, Konoha donates her wedding dress and Minoru donates his bonus as a wedding ring. In the effort to immediately complicate things, Kei’s friends drop by to see where he was yesterday (Mizuho captured him in the middle of the school day and he missed half of his classes) and with him not being home, they decide to visit Mizuho’s house. Avoiding problems, Kei jumps off the porch into the lower yard and into the not so friendly grasp of the dog’s yard.

please teacher

Episode 4: Actually, I Think I Love You

Fast-forward a week, Kei and Mizuho have now been living together for a week – and they are learning things about each other that they didn’t know. Mizuho’s been grading tests, and she tells Kei his grade in advance (a miserable one) and she offers to help him study on Sunday. The next day at school, after giving him his test back, she asks him to resubmit it which gives Koishi some time to work with him (which bothers Mizuho). That night, Mizuho attends a teacher’s meeting and Kei eats dinner with his family; while there Kei is told about a movie that Ichigo has tickets for and the six friends are supposedly going to see together, and Kei agrees to go. That evening, Mizuho comes home a little drunk from the meeting which surprises Kei especially when she knows that she can’t handle alcohol. When he tells her about going to the movies tomorrow, the two start fighting over making plans especially because it looks like Kei is going just to spend time with Koishi. The fight ends with Kei leaving the house and sleeping over in his old room.

The next morning, Kei arrives at the bus station to meet Koishi and the rest of the gang. However, when the rest of the group is late, Koishi calls Ichigo and discovers that the tickets were a ruse to set up Kei and Koishi on a date. Ichigo believes that Koishi isn’t being aggressive enough and thinks that Kei can’t identify Koishi’s feelings towards him (when that obviously isn’t the case). Deciding that they came this far, Kei and Koishi decide to go see a movie anyway and spend the time before the movie eating and playing some games in a nearby arcade. With the whole fight last night, Mizuho decides that she should follow Kei and see if he’s going to do anything inappropriate; when she finds out that none of Kei’s other friends are there, she starts to think that Kei is cheating on her with Koishi. Making things more complicated, Ichigo and Kaede also spy on the pair to see if Koishi is going to make her move on Kei.

After the movie, Mizuho tries to maintain her cover but runs into Kei and Koishi. Asking why she appeared to be following him, she claims that she was charged by his family to keep an eye on him because he is sickly and needs constant attention. Now enraged, Kei leaves Koishi and Mizuho behind and heads to the park. Once confronted again by Mizuho, he gets his feelings out but sustains another standstill. After awakening from the standstill, he discovers Mizuho has been watching over him, and discovers that Mizuho stole a kiss from him (which caused him to leave the standstill). Now understanding more about each other’s emotional needs and how they have become interdependent, the two return home.

Please Teacher is my favorite romance-comedy anime, and I was very happy to see that Bandai decided to license this property. The strong opening theme of the show alone, is enough reason to purchase the disc, and paired with such a great story, this anime is sure to be popular.

- Tazman

(November 23, 2003)

"You have to master your joystick like a fisherman would master bait."

- Gimpy (Undergrads)